Two Standards Based Learning teachers (one secondary math and one secondary English) started submitting comments to the same twitter chats, exchanging professional emails, and attending the same conferences. While we agreed fundamentally in the principles of SBL, a professional debate ensued around the statement, "Well that won't work in MY classroom." Eventually, we developed a healthy respect for the nuances of executing SBL in STEM classes and Flower classes (ELA, world language, social studies, etc.). We began to recognize places where STEM & Flower classes were going to be, and had to be, different not because, "We have always done it that way," but because of sound pedagogical reasons.

Our union of philosophy and divide in execution formed the STEM & Flower Learning Consultants. After attending and presenting at other grading conferences, we realized no one is consulting schools about how to bridge the gap between STEM and Flower classes. We are here to assuage the concern of teachers who state, like we once stated, "That won't work in my class." Let us share our experience (both failures and successes) with your staff to make the transition to Standards Based Learning as seamless as possible.